Welcome!

Anyone who worked at Disney Feature Animation over the past forty years knew who Vance Gerry was. Very few actually got to see his work before it was shipped off to the archives.

Fortunately, the geek in me started making copies of his work and instead of sitting in a folder in my personal archive I want to share these drawings with as many people as possible. If you look long enough at these drawings and paintings you will be able to see the kind, funny, humble and generous man that was Vance Gerry.

Saturday, February 19, 2011

On the way to Alaska, Jenny is accidently washed overboard and Peter jumps in to save her. The Crew is amazed that a cat would do something like that and they launch a wacky attempt to save both cats.

Peter nurses Jenny back to health.

In Alaska one of the crew brags about the heroic cat and is called a liar. A comic fight breaks out causing the captain to flee the town.

Unable to locate any relatives in Alaska, Peter convinces Jenny to return to the old man who truly cares about her. Unfortunately, upon their return they find the old man has passed away, alone and unnoticed.

There are a few missing drawings that Vance did for this section that I can't find right now. I will be sure to post them when I find them.

Monday, February 14, 2011

Jenny introduces Peter to Mr. Grimms, an old man who is always good for a dish of milk.

While Mr. Grimms wolud love Jenny to stay and keep him company, Jenny wants wants to find her family. Peter, who can read, locates a ship bound for the Alaskan gold fields where Jennys family are from.

Jenny has learned that to remain on board a cat has to earn it's keepAnd the ship's cook is a cat's best friend.

Okay. here are the last of the "before Peter turns into a cat" drawings except for the one previously posted by accident, but I'm ignoring that one. However, I never know when I might open a box and find something. I know I have a few on disc that are of such poor quality that the only reason I keep them is to remind me to look for a better quality Xerox.

Now don't wail and pull out your hair just yet. The dirty secret about animation is it ain't over 'till it's over. These drawings take place in San Francisco. Vance had to completely reinvent every drawing when the location abruptly changed to Venice, Italy because a certain V.P. hated San Francisco as a location. To understand why artists and writers are allowed to work for six months on something that has a "knowable" built in flaw would better be explained in another blog I don't have time for called DisneyLeaks or UnspunDisney. Anyway, it is a testament to Vance that he sat down and produced another set of wonderful drawings That I will post after the San Francisco version.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

The story begins with a lonely young boy whose father is an officer in the army and almost never at home. His mother is so wrapped up in society gatherings she has little time for Peter. He is left at home with the family maid who has no patience for little boys. Starving for some kind of emotional connection he looks outside his window for a cat to befriend.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

The story of "The Abandoned" took place in England just after WWII. We heard that Steven Spielberg was playing with the idea of bringing the musical "Cats" to the big screen as an animated film set in England at the same time so we needed a different local. BurnyMattinsen suggested San Francisco and because Joe Grant's mother was a survivor of the Great Earthquake Joe wanted to move our story to San Francisco just before the earthquake of 1906.

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

For about a year Vance, Burny Mattinson, Joe Grant and I worked on a Paul Gallico story called "The Abandoned" about a young boy who turns into a cat. I supposed we could have worked on a story called "Fat Chance Of Being Produced", or "Never To Be Released" but we worked on this one and of course it was abandoned. Vance did many drawings and paintings for "The Abandoned" and I have copies of almost all of them. So, welcome to "The Abandoned" it's going to take some time to post all of them.